


Across the Darkened Stars

by lirin



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Padmé Lives, F/M, Imperial Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:47:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23802565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lirin/pseuds/lirin
Summary: In the years following her supposed death, Padmé Amidala works ceaselessly for the Rebel Alliance. When her ship is intercepted and she is captured by Palpatine's latest Sith Lord apprentice, Darth Vader, she can only hope he doesn't realize who she is. After all, she's never met Darth Vader before...
Relationships: Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker | Darth Vader
Comments: 10
Kudos: 47
Collections: May the 4th Be With You Star Wars Fanworks Exchange 2020





	Across the Darkened Stars

**Author's Note:**

  * For [primeideal](https://archiveofourown.org/users/primeideal/gifts).



Padmé leaned towards the holo pickup, speaking quickly. "There was only a small cruiser, at first. We'd hoped to outrun them, and I think we could have. But then the Star Destroyer followed it out of hyperspace, and caught us in its tractor beam. I don't know if this message will even get through or if our transmissions are blocked." She sighed. "Senator Mothma, I'm so sorry. I know we had so many plans, but you're going to have to save the galaxy without me. Good luck." She leaned forward and ended the transmission.

The whine of her corvette's engines, which had been increasing in pitch over the past few minutes, cut off suddenly, overmastered by the fight against the tractor beam. Padmé winced. Not that she'd had any true hope of escape, but even a false hope was better than no hope at all.

"My lady?"

Padmé turned as her ship's pilot entered the cabin. Just another person she'd placed at risk, by taking this mission. She ought to have come alone, or just brought one of the droids for company. At least she'd decided against letting little Luke tag along. "Yes, Ryl?"

"There's a transmission from the enemy ship."

"The star destroyer? I think it would be best if we ignore it, and not confirm our identity any sooner than we must. We'll claim that our communications equipment broke down."

"It's not that, my lady. It's...we've confirmed _their_ identity. It's the _Devastator_. Darth Vader's flagship."

Padmé stood up slowly, mulling over this news. Darth Vader was Palpatine's most fearsome enforcer. He'd come on the scene soon after Palpatine's takeover, though for the first few years he'd been nothing more than a frightening legend, so it was hard to know exactly when he'd risen to power. But it had been soon enough to make it clear that the Emperor's favor was fickle: little time could have passed between when Palpatine's previous apprentice—Padmé couldn't even bring herself to think his name, it was too painful—had died at Obi-Wan's hands on Mustafar, and when he had raised Vader up as the next Sith Lord.

"It could be worse," Padmé told Ryl. "At least it's not Palpatine. I've never met Darth Vader. Perhaps he won't recognize me."

"He may have seen holos of you," Ryl said. "People say he's half droid, with a computer for a brain. He could have holos of the entire Senate stored in there, past and present."

"We'll just have to take that risk," Padmé said. "I'm dressed much more casually than I was in any of my official Senate holos." Her hair, on the other hand, was arranged in complicated Alderaanian braids, to suit her cover story as a distant cousin of the royal family. But without makeup and with any luck, she looked unlike any portraits that had been made of her—not just the official ones. "And from everything that I've heard," she added, "it seems much more likely that he's human." There had never been Jedi droids, and it stood to reason that there wouldn't be any Sith ones either. "You'll tell them the agreed-upon cover story, and if they accept it, then well and good. If not, then we died in the pursuit of a worthy cause."

"Yes, my lady. And may I say, it has been an honor serving the Rebellion with you."

"Thank you, Ryl," Padmé said. She watched him walk away, to prepare for the corvette to be boarded. "And may the Force be with us," she added in a whisper. She had hated the Force for years now, since it had taken Anakin away from her—and Obi-Wan too, and all the rest—but at a time like this, when she was about to die, it seemed like the right thing to say. With a sigh, she followed Ryl to the landing ramp. Time to meet the fearsome Darth Vader.

He wasn't there. Padmé was almost disappointed, that her ship had been thought too minor to be worth Lord Vader's personal attention. But there were plenty of Imperials present in his stead: two squads of stormtroopers stood surrounding their ship, blasters at the ready, as Padmé and Ryl disembarked. Following their orders, Padmé knelt and clasped her hands behind her head and stayed still while they searched her, first using their hands and then running a scanner over her. Once they were done—and had found nothing, for she had made sure there would be nothing to find—the searchers moved on to Ryl, leaving Padmé on her knees. She didn't move, wishing to lend credence to their "harmless travelers" cover story that Ryl was even now explaining to the stormtroopers.

All around her was a sea of white armor. And then it parted, and utter darkness strode forward.

Darth Vader was even more menacing in person than he'd seemed in the holos. Padmé held herself frozen, willing herself not to show fear. On every side, the stormtroopers stood to attention and were silent. Ryl's voice had stuttered out halfway through his explanation, and now he too was motionless. There was no sound at all in the hangar bay but the heavy tread of Vader's boots as he stepped towards her, and the hiss as he breathed.

In and out his breath rasped, and Padmé held her own breath. In and out, in and out, and now he was right there, looming over her. Padmé tipped her head back and looked up at the black-masked, black-caped monstrosity. She fought a sudden surge of panic. Would he kill her right there in the hangar bay? Would anybody in the Rebellion ever know what had happened to her?

"Padmé?" Vader said. His voice was deep, with a filtered edge to it.

So much for not being recognized. Padmé clenched her teeth. "That is my name, yes."

Vader turned abruptly on his heel, his cape swirling behind him. "Bring the woman," he ordered, and stormed away.

"What of the pilot, my lord?" one of the braver stormtroopers called after him, but he was already gone.

The stormtroopers wasted no time obeying Vader's command. Two of them yanked Padmé to her feet and hurried her along in the Sith Lord's wake before she had time for anything more than a brief anguished glance at Ryl.

How had he known her name? Nobody even knew she was alive—well, except for the Organas and Mon Mothma and a handful of other Rebels, all of whom she trusted implicitly. For him to recognize her so quickly, even though her survival was one of the best-kept secrets of the Rebel Alliance...she feared that Vader was even more dangerous than they had reckoned.

And then she was there, in Darth Vader's private sitting-room, shoved to the floor by the stormtroopers who were already quickly departing. As soon as she had caught her breath, she climbed quickly to her knees, for she saw no need to grovel more than she had already—but before she could finish standing on her own, Vader was before her, hand outstretched to help her rise. "How is it that you are alive?" he asked, breath hissing underneath his words. "He said you were dead."

"He?" Padmé asked. Gaining her feet, she dropped his hand like a hot lamta. This was not how she had expected this interrogation to go.

"The Emperor. He said—" Vader stepped back, paced across the room, and paced back. "He said I killed you."

Padmé stared. There was only one conclusion she could make from what he had said, and yet—

They stood there without speaking for nearly a minute, staring at each other. Finally, Padmé could delay the painful question no longer. "Anakin?" she whispered.

He flinched. "That's not my name anymore."

"Well, you can hardly expect me to call you Lord Vader," Padmé said, her voice slowly regaining strength. Inside, though, she wanted to cry. Why had no one told her? Had Obi-Wan and Yoda known, and yet kept this horrible truth from her? What could she tell him about the twins? Would they be in danger from their own father if she revealed where they were hidden away? She winced. Things had been easier when she'd thought Anakin was merely dead.

Vader reached out a gloved hand and touched her cheek. "I wanted to save you," he said. "It's not too late. Join me and we'll overthrow the Emperor. You can rule at my side. You'll be an Empress."

Padmé shook her head. "It's not too late," she replied. The words were heavy on her tongue. "Join me and we'll help the Alliance restore the Republic. The galaxy can be a democracy once again."

"Democracy was a failed experiment," Vader said firmly. "Only with power and might can—"

"Have you completely forgotten who you're speaking to?" Padmé asked. "Or did you never really know me? I'm beginning to believe that I never really knew you. But if you think that the Emperor's rule, with all the people he's hurt and subdued and conspired against, is better than people being able to rule themselves with their own representation, then you're a fool." She stepped back and looked him up and down. "But then, I think you already made that choice. So maybe it is too late."

"Padmé..." He said nothing more, but simply looked at her.

Padmé stared back. She wished she could see anything of the man she had married—the man she loved—through the unblinking black lenses of that mask, but there was nothing there to remind her of the man he had once been. The man she'd been sure there was good in yet, if she could only find it. "Anakin..." What could she say?

"I cannot go with you," he said. "But if you are unwilling to join me, then I will not take you against your will, nor will I reveal to the Emperor that you yet live. I will—" Once again he paced quickly across the room and back. "I will let you go, and you can go back to your friends as if I had never found you, and all will be as it was before. That is all I can offer you."

"Then it will have to be enough," Padmé said. It was not enough, it could never be enough, but what other choice did she have? "And perhaps someday we will meet again in better circumstances."

"Perhaps," he said. He held out his hand once more, and this time she took it with more alacrity. She wondered if, under the black glove, the same metal still moved there that had grasped her hand at their wedding. She clutched his hand a little tighter at the thought, and after a moment's hesitation, he laced their fingers together. "I will tell my men that you were an Imperial spy among the Rebels whose mission was not to be impeded, and I will erase all records of your presence here. But you must be careful. Your safety lies in secrecy, and I do not know how much the Emperor already knows. He does not tell me everything."

Hand in hand, they walked back to Padmé's ship. "You'll release my pilot, as well?" Padmé asked, keying in the code to lower the landing ramp.

"I will give the order as soon as I leave you," he said. "Padmé—"

She turned around. "Yes?"

"The child. You were going to die in childbirth, that's what I saw in my dream, and that's why I did all this for you. But you didn't die. But the child—what happened to the child?"

 _There were two, and they're perfect,_ Padmé wanted to say. _She has your nose and he has your eyes. Leia was adopted by the Organas; I see her every few months when I visit them as their "cousin". Luke mostly stays at our base on Polis Massa with C-3PO for nursemaid. (C-3PO's not very good with children, you'd laugh, Ani, really you would.) Once in a while, Luke even accompanies me when I travel, on the missions that are expected to be the safest. Today's mission was supposed to be one of those. You almost met your son._

Instead, she shook her head. "The child died," she said. "Maybe that's what your dream really was about. Goodbye, Anakin." She turned her back and walked up the landing ramp, blinking back the tears that forced their way unbidden into her eyes.

"Goodbye, Padmé," he said behind her. His voice sounded nothing like the one she remembered—from stolen moments and pillow whispers so long ago—but perhaps in the rhythm of the words she could still find something that was familiar. But it didn't really matter. Without looking back, she keyed the landing ramp shut.

Only after Ryl had rejoined her and they had jumped to lightspeed did the tears come. She wondered if, wherever the _Devastator_ was now, her husband was crying too. She hoped he was. 

She didn't know if he could.

"Why did they let us go?" Ryl asked after a while. "Not that I'm complaining."

"I convinced them that I was a double agent, an Imperial spy undercover with the Rebels," Padmé said. "They won't be coming after us. But I'm cancelling the rest of the mission. Our timing is no longer ideal and we don't know if the ship's been compromised. I want you to find somewhere uninhabited to land and check over the ship thoroughly, to check for trackers and anything else they might have put aboard while it was unattended."

"And then?"

Padmé stared out the viewport. The starlines of hyperspace blurred with the last few tears that still burned her eyes. "Then we're going to Alderaan," she said. "The Rebellion needs to be warned right away. I'll send another message to Mon Mothma now, but I want to speak to Bail Organa in person." _I need to see Leia. I need to make sure my children will be safe._

Ryl leaned back in the pilot's seat. "Sounds good," he said. "I'll feed the course into the navicomputer."

"Very good," Padmé said, and almost laughed. As if anything could be good anymore, after what she'd found out today. She rubbed her eyes, forcing the tears away. "Let me know when we're close to Alderaan."


End file.
